John McEnroe insists tennis stars must boycott Grand Slams over prize money

John McEnroe believes tennis stars must boycott Grand Slam events to receive a greater share of tournament revenue.

Stars such as Jannik Sinner and Aryna Sabalenka limited their media time at the French Open and Wimbledon in a pointed protest, as players target a 22 per cent share of Grand Slam tournament revenue by 2030.

Yet speaking at the Laver Cup held in London over the weekend, McEnroe said players may have to take drastic action: “I’m going to say this: the players should be partners in the majors. Number one.

“The fact that they’re not causes friction, to me, that they’re getting such a small part of the revenue. I’m hopeful and I’m sceptical. You’ve got to have a little bit of hope, or it won’t happen. But I’m sceptical because nothing changes, it seems, or very little.

“I’m a backseat driver now. I’m commentating on a match, so it’s a lot easier than playing, but I still enjoy being a part of it. But I understand what the players go through. I’ve been there, and so my sympathies are with them.

“I understand that Wimbledon’s a great event. It’s obviously incredible, and so is the US Open. Australia’s done a great job. And the French, all of them have done a great job. But I believe the players should be partners in that success.

“The only way to succeed in doing that, in my opinion, is you’re going to have to boycott one or two of these [slams].”

McEnroe also believes the fifth set of matches at majors should be replaced by a match tie-break, as the length of contests and late-night scheduling continues to be a pair of unsolved problems, especially after Ben Shelton’s win over Carlos Alcaraz at the US Open finished at 3:33am.

“Some of the matches I called [at the US Open] went in excess of five hours,” he said. “You watch what you call football here where they have a penalty shoot-out. Why do they have a penalty shoot-out? Because people are worried about the attention span of some of the fans who will turn off, is my guess.

“Otherwise you’d just keep playing until a goal is scored, so tennis has to look at that. We finally got to the stage where there’s tie-breakers in the fifth set at all four majors, but I still think more needs to be done because it’s a great sport we have.

“You don’t want people playing at 3.30 in the morning.”

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